


meddlesome moon lady #1

by midnightsnapdragon



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Background Zutara, Element Swap AU, Gambling, Gen, Godly Mischief, Tapestry of Fate, The Writer Knows Nothing About Pai Sho, vague spirit world bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 06:40:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21796267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightsnapdragon/pseuds/midnightsnapdragon
Summary: In which the sun and moon play dice with bending.
Kudos: 26





	meddlesome moon lady #1

**Author's Note:**

> Based on [biorn21](https://biorn21.tumblr.com/)'s excellent [element swap AU](https://biorn21.tumblr.com/tagged/element-swap).

While the Avatar and his friends messed around in the Western Air Temple, the sun and the moon were playing dice.

Not actual dice, sorry. Figurative dice. Pai sho is what they were playing. But the gods are shameless, incorrigible gamblers, and because living for thousands of years doesn’t give you any new ideas or divine creative abilities, they usually bet on mortal lives.

As a princess (chieftain's daughter, etc. etc.) Yue had been taught better. Gambling is a man's game. Gambling is for the lower classes. Gambling will leave you stiff and bootless in the cold. _But_ since she was about as Up There as anyone could get, and because she'd successfully gambled her life to save the world –

Well.

She could do whatever she wanted, couldn't she?

"Your move," said Agni, leaning back in his chair.

Yue hummed and peered at the board. The flower tile was still smoking where he'd touched it. "Remind me what we're playing for?"

He nodded at the far side of the room, toward the enormous shimmering tapestry. The two of them were on their half-hour break between sunset and moonrise, so everything was lit up in the smoky purple light of dusk; everything threw a menacing shadow.

"Whoever wins gets a shot at that," said Agni, with a glowing smile. He did not have teeth, really. Or pupils. His eyes and his mouth shone with white-hot light, stark against the coals of his face. "The Weaver won't be back for at least another sunrise. Whatever we do, she can't undo it without ..." He grinned at Yue. "… severe consequences."

Yue raised an elegant brow. In _theory_, the two of them were the actual, literal sun and moon, and if they so desired, they could bend the rules of time a little bit. Letting her fingers hover over the tiles, she asked, "Will there be another sunrise?"

"We're on a schedule, love. It's tedious, but this –” He gestured to the board between them. "– is about as rebellious as one can get up here."

"Shame," Yue murmured, before making her final move. "I should have been a more rebellious daughter."

"Well, I have it on good authority that y- what?!" Agni bent over the board, mouth widening in outrage. "You – when did you ..."

"Well played," Yue said graciously. She held out a dainty hand. "Another game tomorrow?"

He glowered at her. "I'm not falling for that again."

"Fair enough." She withdrew her hand. "I'm only making sure you have your wits about you. Thought you were winning for a hot minute there, didn’t you?"

"That mortal boy has forever corrupted your sense of humour."

Yue rose and drifted over to the tapestry of Fate. She didn’t have long: when the stars came out, and they would soon, she’d have to begin her nightly journey across the sky. Still, she dawdled, letting her fingers quest lightly over the faintly glimmering threads, feeling each one shiver and sigh.

“Be quick,” Agni said warningly from behind her. “You don’t have all night.”

She ignored him.

The tapestry was made up of black thread for nonbenders, white for airbenders, blue for water, green for earth, and yellow for fire. Yue had thought that counterintuitive at first; after all, fire was drawn in red in every scroll she’d ever seen. But when she asked the Weaver about it, the old spider just cackled and said that red thread was used for something else.

"It's a colour scheme issue," she'd said with a three-eyed wink. Which was pretty cryptic, but apparently becoming the moon didn't give you clearance on everything. There were still many secret things in the Spirit World, and the Weaver gave up her secrets hardest of all.

Yue turned her attention to the threads she wanted. One was blue, the other yellow, and they converged a couple of times – along with a black one, a green one and a single unbroken, glowing strand that traced the whole fabulous length of the tapestry – before entwining closely.

And as it happened, they were already sewn together by a red string.

Yue bit her lip. That was off-limits. But surely if she made one tiny adjustment ...

"Take your time, love," called the sun in a bored voice. "It’s not like the laws of the universe forbid us to be late, or anything."

Yue looked up. The stars were coming out. She had to start her ascent soon, or the fallout would be catastrophic.

With a deep breath, she reached out and touched the yellow thread with the pad of her finger. A piece of it turned waterbender blue. Then she did the same with the blue thread so that it splotched firebender's yellow.

_There._

"You look very pleased with yourself," said Agni. He'd appeared at her side, giving off the faint smell of campfire smoke and scorched flesh and sun-warmed leather. "What do you have against the boy? He’s done his time. We agreed to give him a chance."

"We are giving him a chance," said Yue. "She isn't.”

“Uh huh.”

“Besides, she loses her temper so often, she'll _have_ to learn some self-control, or risk burning down the whole temple around them."

Agni gave her a skeptical look. “Right."

"She has so much potential," Yue went on, with a wistful sigh. "To fix things. To change things. To pass on the legacy of waterbending – _my_ legacy. But not if she can't work together with him."

He coughed. "My lady. Not that I doubt your ... noble intentions or, or lunar goodness, but ... I’m fairly certain you're doing this just so you can watch Katara set herself on fire."

She gave him a reproachful look. “That would be petty!”

He made as if to pat her shoulder, then appeared to think better of it. "Well, at any rate, you’re adjusting magnificently. Making fun of mortals is the most fun to be had in ages, and it never gets old.”

Yue tucked her hair behind her ear.

“I don’t suppose we have anything else to do for the rest of eternity.”

…

The sun had barely risen in the mortal world when the air in the Western Air Temple cracked with two simultaneous screams of horror.

Zuko had frozen in the middle of his morning bending forms. His fist was still extended in a punch. But there was no fireball. Not even a lick of heat.

Instead, the water in the nearby fountain had sloshed weakly over the rim.

He looked from his hand, to the wet tile floor, to where water dripped pathetically down the side of the fountain, and began to hyperventilate.

Katara, meanwhile, had been about to wash up before starting breakfast. She’d waved her arms to draw water from her flask, put her hands to her face, and nearly given herself a scar to match Zuko’s.

And somewhere in the spirit world, far far away, Yue watched with a beatific smile.

Oh, irony.

At the very least, it would make Sokka laugh.

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are always appreciated!


End file.
